


One More Night

by orphan_account



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-10
Updated: 2014-01-10
Packaged: 2018-01-08 05:31:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,654
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1128905
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Liam doesn't necessarily want to be cheating on his girlfriend or helping Zayn cheat on his fiance, but this has been going on long enough that he knows he's not going to stop himself at this point. Especially since after Zayn gets married this will have to end.</p>
            </blockquote>





	One More Night

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: This is a complete work of fiction, I do not know any of the characters mentioned in this fic nor do I have any special insight into the personal relationships of these people. Also, the title is from Maroon 5.

When Liam drifted awake, it was still dark outside. Somebody, probably Zayn because he always complained about getting overheated, had pushed the covers down to their waist. He carefully untangled himself from Zayn’s body and slipped out of bed and into the bathroom. Liam wondered if he could just sneak back to his hotel room or even the bus, but he knew he wouldn’t actually do that to Zayn. This situation was fucked up but he was a willing participant, and sneaking away like he was ashamed of this wouldn’t change that.

He washed his hands after relieving himself and went back to the bedroom. Zayn had woken up and was watching him through half-lidded eyes. “Sorry for waking you,” Liam said when he got back in bed. He pulled the covers up because he couldn’t fall asleep if he was cold, which was probably why Zayn usually waited until Liam had fallen asleep to push them off.

“It’s fine, I thought maybe you left,” Zayn said.

Liam winced slightly because it was pretty bad that Zayn even thought he would do that. “I wouldn’t,” Liam said. “Not without telling you.”

“I know, I just…well, I’d deserve it, wouldn’t I?” Zayn asked.

Liam didn’t answer him. It wasn’t necessarily that he thought that Zayn _deserved_  to wake up alone like Liam had gotten what he wanted and didn’t want anything to do with him past that, because that wasn’t true. But Liam wasn’t going to pretend that he hadn’t considered it because, well, he was hurt. There was only so much Liam could take and they were coming close to the breaking point. After all, this couldn’t go on forever. That’s what Danielle had told him when they broke up the final time.

“You’re letting go of me for something that’s never going to last, Liam,” Danielle had said.

“I’m not,” Liam had argued. “I’m not letting go, I don’t want to break up. That’s all you.”

“You can’t be with Zayn and me, that’s not how it works, Liam,” Danielle had said in exasperation.

The only problem was that Liam _needed_ Zayn and he didn’t need Danielle. It wasn’t that he hadn’t loved Danielle, he had, just like how now he had genuine feelings for Sophia. The way he felt for them was just different. Danielle had been right, though. Zayn had tattooed Perrie on his arm, he had asked Perrie to marry him, Perrie was _it_ for Zayn. And okay, they were still hooking up and Zayn hadn’t said anything about stopping, but Liam was pretty sure that he couldn’t sleep with a married man. Even if he had been with the married man longer than his wife will have been. That just wasn’t how these things worked.

Perhaps it was the knowledge that this was going to end soon that made Liam keep coming back for more. After the first time they had slept together, in a flurry of too many shots and repressed emotions, the guilt had eaten up at him. It wasn’t that Danielle found out that he was cheating on her, it was that after so many months of trying, and failing, to stop it from happening again and again and again he had felt too guilty to keep it from her. Ideally, she would have agreed to share him, but realistically Liam had known that wasn’t going to happen. It had been a surprise she even agreed to try to have an open relationship for a few for months before she finally made him choose.

Even now that he was dating Sophia and keeping it from her, there was a certain guilt there, but not one that kept him from choosing Zayn. So it hurt that Zayn had chosen Perrie, because that was what he had done, really, by asking her to marry him. The worst part was that Liam didn’t even dislike Perrie. The whole band was friends with Jesy, Jade, Leigh-Anne and Perrie so it had been impossible not to get to know her. The fact that Perrie was such a sweet person, a person that honestly _was_ a good match for Zayn and someone Zayn was so plainly in love with made it worse. Liam could understand being second choice to her. He didn’t like it, he secretly resented Zayn for choosing her and resented Perrie for being chosen by him, but he understood it.

Liam didn’t know how Zayn could keep this from Perrie, although he knew Zayn felt guilt, saw it in his eyes. And they didn’t talk about it, not with the rest of the band and certainly not with each other. Talking about it made it real, and that’s not what this was. This was a compilation of stolen moments in the dead of night, letting their secrets fade away in a sea of beds they would never see again when they left whatever city they were in. Louis sometimes said it was starting to become self-evident in plain light without specifying what “it” was, but Liam didn’t believe that. Him and Zayn were friends, and obviously it had become self-evident that they were _close_ friends but nothing more than that could be proved and what the shippers imagined was happening wasn’t his problem.

Zayn kissed Liam’s shoulder, breaking him out of all of his thoughts. However, when he turned his head to look at him, Zayn wouldn’t meet his eyes and it took him a few seconds realize that it was because Zayn had taken his lack of answer to mean that Liam did think he’d have deserved it if Liam left. “Stop thinking, Liam,” Zayn whispered, kissing his collarbone next. 

“I don’t think you’d deserve it,” Liam said, his eyes fluttering closed as Zayn started to kiss a line up his neck.

“It’s fine,” Zayn answered. “I’m glad you didn’t leave.”

“You should have known I wouldn’t,” Liam breathed out just before Zayn kissed him.

After a few minutes, Liam turned, pushing Zayn down on the bed, and Zayn looked up at him with bright eyes looking so happy all of a sudden that it hurt. He circled his arms around Liam’s waist and pulled him down against him, so their bodies were flush together, and Liam leaned his forehead against his neck just breathing Zayn in. Liam forced himself as best as he could to clear his mind, it didn’t completely work, but it worked enough to let him enjoy this. He nipped at the skin that connected Zayn’s neck and shoulder. “Again?” Liam asked. “You’re going to be worn out tomorrow.”

“Cocky,” Zayn said in a teasing tone of voice. “Tomorrow’s a bus night.”

Even though the rest of the band pretty much knew, or at the very least suspected, that something was going on between them, they didn’t have sex on the tour bus. So that meant that whichever nights they spent on the bus they might cuddle each other to sleep or sneak a goodnight kiss but that was the most that would happen between them.

“True,” Liam said as he leaned down to kiss Zayn again.

This part was always so easy to fall into. Maybe if not, this wouldn’t keep happening despite the fact that Zayn was engaged to someone that sure as hell wasn’t him. But Liam knew it wasn’t that clearcut and simple. It extended past the physical for Liam, and he was pretty sure it wasn’t just about the sex to Zayn either. Although this part was pretty fucking great too. He liked the way Zayn would pull on his bottom lip with his teeth, how his fingers would trail over his abs every other minute, and he even found the way Zayn hissed at him to hurry up sexy.

However, nothing measured up to the first moments of pushing inside of Zayn. He always made a point of staring into his eyes when he did and Zayn was aways staring back. In that moment there was no Perrie, no Sophia, no engagement, no pressure to act normal in front of thousands of people. There was only Liam and Zayn, this was theirs, and no one could take this away from Liam. In that moment, as their racing hearts became in sync with each other’s everything else stopped. Then Zayn would arch his back and let out a long-drawn moan or he’d wrap his legs around Liam’s waist to pull him in deeper and time would start again.

Zayn pulled his head down to kiss him as Liam started moving in slow, smooth strokes. Later, when they were with the rest of guys in front of hundreds of girls, they’d deny this even to themselves. Zayn would answer another dozen questions about his engagement with Perrie with a smile on his face that Liam knew he couldn’t help and he’d tell the interviewer that yes, he had a girlfriend. He might sing lyrics to him on stage like he always did and Liam would smile, giddily, maybe reach out to touch him, trying to ignore the fact that they could only be friends. And then after the show Zayn would call Perrie and go to a room Liam wasn’t in to talk to her, to tell her how much he missed her and loved her and how he couldn’t wait to get home so they could spend Christmas together and then start properly planning their wedding and he’d call Sophia and they’d talk about their days while Liam pretended he wasn't a cheating asshole. After they'd said good night to their respective girlfriends, Zayn would come find Liam or vice versa and they’d shut themselves out from reality to immerse themselves in something they both knew was wrong but had given up fighting against ages ago.

Liam felt a heat coil in his lower stomach and reached in between his and Zayn’s body to stroke Zayn’s dick. Zayn was moaning shamelessly, saying Liam’s name like he was the only thing left that mattered to him and looking at him with a desperate kind of need and with something else too that Liam couldn’t figure out. He waited until Zayn finally came, his head tipped back as his whole body clenched around Liam and his lips parted in silent pleasure, before he finally let himself finish too, a rush of emotion hitting him.

“I think I’m in love with you,” Liam gasped out, before he had recovered, before his brain could tell him that it was a bad idea to say it even if he was feeling it. It wasn’t the first time he had thought that he was in love with Zayn, in fact, he had thought it so many times that he was absolutely certain he was in love with Zayn. He just didn’t want Zayn to know how much this would hurt him when it ended because he was just as sure that Zayn didn’t love him back.

To his surprise, Zayn didn’t look shocked or push him away or anything. He just cupped his face with both hands when Liam tried to look away so that he had to look in his eyes. “I love you too,” Zayn said.

Liam shook his head when Zayn dropped his hands. “Don’t,” he said, rolling off Zayn to lay besides him. “Don’t tell me something you don’t mean, don’t _do_ that to me.”

There was a frown on Zayn’s face, but he didn’t say anything in response, he just reached for his pack of cigarettes. He lit one and took a long pull from it, his eyes fixed on the ceiling before he handed the pack to Liam. Without a word, Zayn got out of bed, disappeared into the bathroom to clean himself up, and when he came back into the room he slipped into his boxers and discarded jeans and went out to the balcony. Liam didn’t know what he was supposed to do. Usually when someone upset Zayn and he went off to be alone he didn’t mind if Liam joined him. Of-course, Liam had never upset him so much that Zayn had pulled away from him to be alone.

If he went out there, though, Zayn might want an apology and Liam didn’t think he owed him one. Zayn didn’t love him. If he did he wouldn’t be getting married. Maybe he had convinced himself that he loved Liam, so that he could live with cheating on Perrie, but if he really loved him he wouldn’t force him to watch him get married. Liam sighed and took out a cigarette, deciding to wait for Zayn to come back. When he still didn’t come back inside after his finished it, Liam lit a second one, wondering how serious his addiction was getting if getting nervous caused him to start chain-smoking.

Finally, Zayn came back in and took the jeans off before he came back into bed. “You don’t have to believe me,” Zayn muttered. He was trying to sound angry, but he sounded hurt. “I know it’s true.”

Zayn turned so he was on his side, his back to Liam. “If it were you wouldn’t be engaged,” Liam mumbled.

“What?” Zayn asked, turning so he could look at Liam. “She doesn’t have anything to do with you.”

“Except we’re both shagging you.”

“Me and Sophia are both fucking _you_ and _she’s_ not a part of this.”

“Because she’s not a threat to this,” Liam said feeling like an asshole for making Sophia sound like she wasn’t important. “But you’re going to marry Perrie. You’re going to _marry_ her and buy a house with her and maybe even have kids with her. If you loved me, you wouldn’t make me _watch_ that.”

“Why would I risk losing that for someone I didn’t love?” Zayn asked. “Loving you doesn’t mean I don’t love Perrie…it’s just two different things. There’s a me and you and then there’s a me and Perrie, but those two aren’t involved.”

“Yes they are, just because you don’t want them to be doesn’t mean they aren’t,” Liam said frustrated.

Zayn stayed quiet but the stubborn look on his face didn’t fall away. Finally, he just said, “I don’t want to talk about this anymore. I know it’s true, and that’s enough.”

Liam stared at him for a few seconds before finally shrugging. “Fine, keep it to yourself then.”

“Fine,” Zayn snapped.

He turned away from him again, facing the window. Liam worried his lip with his teeth for a few seconds knowing that he wouldn’t be able to get back to sleep without Zayn touching him. He didn’t know if it was because he had gotten used to it or if it was because having Zayn not touching him because he didn’t want to left him as cold as it to sleep without covers. So after a few seconds of deliberation, he scooted closer to Zayn and wrapped his arms around his waist.

Zayn let out a sigh but leaned back into him, his body relaxing. “I’m sorry,” Zayn whispered. It sounded like he was close to crying so Liam shushed him softly. He didn’t want an apology at any rate, since it didn’t really solve anything. Thankfully, after a few shaky breaths that felt like Zayn was still trying to hold back tears, his breathing evened out.

“Do you want to stop?”

Liam closed his eyes and sighed. He knew what the correct answer was and yet he still gave a different one. “No.”

“Do you think you’ll believe me one day?”

“I don’t know. Maybe,” Liam said. He wanted to believe it, and he was good at making himself believe things that he wished they were true. However, he couldn’t do that to himself, because it would hurt to accept Zayn loved him and it hadn’t been enough.

“Okay,” Zayn said but there a tone of resignation in his voice.

“Okay.” 


End file.
